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Thoughts following Jordan Montgomery’s elbow injury

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(Presswire)

Last night’s stellar win over the Astros came at a price. Jordan Montgomery had to leave the game after a seven-pitch 1-2-3 first inning with what the Yankees are calling elbow tightness. He’s returning to New York today for tests. Yuck. Losing a starter is never good, especially a young starter like Montgomery. Let’s break down this rather unfortunate development.

1. For what it’s worth, both Montgomery and Aaron Boone downplayed the injury following the game. “Maybe I’ll just miss a start. You never know. But I would be surprised if it was something real bad … It’s not like I’m hurting that bad,” said Montgomery to Bryan Hoch and Erik Boland. He added he first felt the tightness two days ago. Okay, so what happens now? Well, Montgomery is going to travel back to New York and squeeze into an MRI tube. The Yankees tend to announce these things fairly quickly, so I imagine we’ll hear some sort of update later today. Hopefully it’s inflammation or something like that. If it’s something more serious, Montgomery will go for a second opinion. They always do. With elbows, it’s hard not to think worst case scenario (Tommy John surgery), and there’s nothing you can do other than hope for the best. The Yankees usually don’t keep secrets with their MLB players. Once Montgomery gets back to New York and is examined, we should know what’s up.

2. I am forever a “play it safe” guy, especially with young pitchers, so I say stick Montgomery on the disabled list even if the MRI brings back good news today. It’s a 10-day DL now. The ten days fly by. Even if it’s a minor injury, just put him on the disabled list, knock out whatever it is, and don’t play shorthanded. No matter what the MRI shows I expect the Yankees to be cautious and put Montgomery on the disabled list later today. They’d need to come up with a spot starter for Sunday, but, after that, they’ll need their fifth starter only once over the following 15 days. They could give Montgomery a nice long rest, let him make a rehab start, and not play shorthanded. Why wouldn’t you do that? I hope the MRI brings good news. If it does, I’d still like to see Montgomery take a quick 10-day DL stint just to make sure he’s a-okay rather than rush him back to start this weekend or whatever. There’s no reason to push him in early May. Missing a few games now is better than missing a lot of games later.

3. Okay, so if the Yankees do put Montgomery on the disabled list, who comes up? There are only two healthy pitchers in the minors and on the 40-man roster: Albert Abreu and Jonathan Loaisiga. Both are Single-A kids and not realistic call-up options. (Abreu made his first start of the season earlier this week after having his appendix removed during Spring Training.) Non-40-man roster options include David Hale (re-signed yesterday), Cody Carroll, and Nestor Cortes. Chance Adams started two days ago and wouldn’t be called up today because he’s not available to pitch. My guess is it would be Hale. Domingo German is the favorite to move into Montgomery’s rotation spot — he earned it with his performance last night and Boone told Hoch that German will “probably” step into the rotation — meaning the Yankees would be short a long reliever. With German not able to pitch deep into games yet and the perpetual concern about short starts, calling up a short reliever like Carroll doesn’t seem like a thing that’ll happen. Letting Hale sit in the bullpen as the seldom used eighth reliever strikes me as the likely course of action, even just temporarily, until the Yankees get to Monday’s off-day. (As for 40-man roster space, I have to think Jacoby Ellsbury is a 60-day DL candidate at this point, so there you go.)

4. German more than held his own last night and as far as I’m concerned, he is far and away the best fill-in starter candidate in the organization right now. Justus Sheffield has been pretty great this year — conveniently enough, he lines up perfectly to take Montgomery’s spot — but he’s yet to pitch in Triple-A and the Yankees have set development goals that I’m not sure Sheffield has achieved yet. I don’t like altering a top prospect’s development plan based on a big league roster need. Teams do it, but it’s not ideal. In this case, with German available, calling up Sheffield doesn’t make sense to me. Adams has not been great in Triple-A this season (5.11 ERA and 4.90 FIP), though he is coming back from elbow surgery, and I wouldn’t be surprised at all if the Yankees looked past his small sample size numbers this year and focused on his overall body of work. Adams could be a Montgomery replacement, for sure. I don’t think the Yankees would go to Adams if this is a short-term injury. If it’s a one or two start deal, it’ll probably just be German. Teams tend to take the path of least resistance. If Montgomery is out longer term, then Adams becomes a more realistic option. Hopefully he rattles off a good Triple-A start or three before getting the call.

5. As for external rotation options, free agency doesn’t have much to offer. Clay Buchholz was released yesterday after a meh three-game minor league stint (16 IP, 10 H, 2 R, 7 BB, 9 K) with the Royals. Kansas City’s pitching staff is pretty thin. If they didn’t think Buchholz could help at all, it’s hard to see the Yankees grabbing him. Other free agents like R.A. Dickey and Ubaldo Jimenez aren’t worth it. They’re probably not ready to step into a rotation anyway. Free agency offers no help. The trade market? It’s still a little early to swing a meaningful trade at this point of the season. Maybe a smart tanking team decides to get out ahead of the market and trade a veteran now before everyone else hangs the “For Sale” sign. Who could that be? The Rangers with Bartolo Colon? The Reds with Homer Bailey? The Padres with Clayton Richard? Yuck. Yuck yuck yuck. I’d never rule out a small depth pickup. The Yankees have a recent history of going internal to solve their roster needs and I expect them to do the same here, while gearing up for a run at an impact pitcher at the trade deadline. The Montgomery injury won’t lead to a rash trade. That’s not how the Yankees operate now. German’s going to get his chance.

Update: Montgomery exits tonight’s start with elbow injury

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(Bob Levey/Getty)

9:00pm ET: Montgomery left the game with left elbow tightness and will return to New York to be evaluated tomorrow, the Yankees announced. Yuck.

“We didn’t have any concern (before the game), but yeah, always when a pitcher comes out with forearm/elbow tightness, that’s a concern,” said Aaron Boone during an in-game MLB Network interview. “Hopefully we can get some answers on it tomorrow.”

8:38pm ET: Jordan Montgomery left tonight’s start after one inning with an injury. He tossed a 1-2-3 first inning on seven pitches and looked like regular old Jordan Montgomery, though replays showed him flexing his left arm a bit as he walked off the field. That’s not good. His velocity was fine though.

Here’s the video of Montgomery’s final pitch and the arm flex:

The injury just happened, so the Yankees have yet to announce any updates. It goes without saying losing Montgomery for any length of time would really suck. Domingo German, who replaced Montgomery out of the bullpen, is presumably next in line for a rotation spot.

For what it’s worth, Montgomery has been very durable throughout his career, all through the minors and college. He hasn’t missed a start since high school, maybe earlier. There’s no injury history here. Hoping for good news. Fingers crossed.

Yankeemetrics: Bronx Rising, Happy Gleyber Day (April 19-22)

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(AP)

Survive and advance
Coming off a pathetic loss to the tanking Marlins, the Yankees badly needed a win in Thursday’s series opener. Although it was far from a memorable and glorious game — one that was highlighted by sloppy defense — the Yankees held on for the 4-3 victory.

On a strict pitch count in his first start since coming off the DL, CC Sabathia played the familiar role of Stopper Ace as he gave up no earned runs (two unearned) on four hits in 4 1/3 innings. Since 2017, he now has a 1.88 ERA in 13 regular-season starts following a Yankee loss, and the team has won 11 of those 13 games (and he is 9-0 as a pitcher).

David Robertson lived up to his Houdini nickname when he loaded the bases with no outs in the eighth inning. No problem for the pitching magician! He struck out the next batter, Kevin Pillar, the 10th guy he’d faced with the bases loaded and no outs in his career. Those 10 plate appearances have resulted in eight strikeouts, one hit and one sac fly.

Overall, Robertson has struck out 43 percent of batters he’s faced with the bases loaded in his career (compared to 32 percent in all other situations). Since his debut in 2008, he owns the highest bases-loaded strikeout rate among the 160-plus pitchers that have faced at least 65 guys in that span.

(Getty)

Gray’d Out
Another game, another dip into the pool of mediocrity. The Yankees followed up their win on Thursday with a frustrating loss on Friday. Back to .500 again for the New York Jekyll-and-Hydes. They coughed up a couple early two-run leads thanks to another shoddy starting pitching performance, and then saw the bullpen throw more gasoline onto the fire as the Blue Jays pulled away for the 8-5 victory.

Sonny Gray’s struggles continued with another dreadful outing. He was pulled in the fourth inning after giving up five runs, and showed a complete lack of command with two wild pitches and four walks. He’s pitched more than four innings in only one of his four starts this season, and as of Saturday morning, he was the only American League pitcher with three starts of four innings pitched or fewer.

There are a ton of ways to slice-and-dice the data and show how terrible Gray has been in his last two starts (last week at Boston: 3 innings, 6 runs, 2 walks, 3 wild pitches). Here’s a couple to chew on:

  • The only other guy in franchise history to pitch back-to-back starts with at least five earned runs allowed and multiple wild pitches was A.J. Burnett in 2011.
  • Gray is the first Yankee (since at least 1908) with consecutive outings of fewer than four innings and at least two wild pitches thrown.

And our Obscure Yankeemetric of the Series: Gray is the only pitcher in major-league history with back-to-back starts allowing at least five earned runs and throwing two wild pitches while getting no more than 10 outs in each game.

Another alarming stat from his outing was his zero strikeouts and just two swings-and-misses among his 73 pitches. Gray had at least one strikeout in each of his 112 starts with the A’s; he now has two zero-strikeout games in 15 starts with the Yankees. The two swinging strikes are his fewest in any game in his career where he’s thrown at least 20 pitches.

One of his biggest issues was falling behind in the count, as he threw first-pitch strikes to just 6-of-19 batters (31.6 percent), the worst first-pitch strike rate in any game of his career. The Blue Jays swung at only one pitch in an 0-0 count, as most of Gray’s offerings were off the plate:

How important was getting ahead to Gray? He faced 19 batters in the game:

9 of the 13 batters that started 1-0 reach base – via five hits and four walks – while he retired the other six batters that started 0-1 (or put the first pitch in play).

Overall this season, it’s been the same story, especially when compared to league averages:

2018 Opponent OPS
Gray MLB Avg
After 0-1 .467 .599
After 1-0 1.174 .822

One inning is enough
Sometimes, you can predict baseball. The Yankees continued their seesaw battle with .500, moving one game above the break-even mark (10-9) after their 9-1 win on Saturday.

The game was a nail-biter through the first five frames before the Yankees exploded for seven runs in the sixth inning. It was their highest-scoring inning since putting up a seven-spot against the Rockies on June 14, 2016. Here’s your Believe-It-Or-Not Yankeemetric: Since that date, every other team in baseball had at least one inning with seven-or-more runs scored.

(New York Post)

Aaron Judge put the Yankees on the board early with a two-run blast in the third inning. He crushed a 3-0 inside fastball from Marcus Stroman and sent it 443 feet into the second deck in left field — his first career homer on a 3-0 pitch. Over the last three seasons (since 2016), the only other Yankee to homer on a 3-0 pitch was Starlin Castro.

Jordan Montgomery was tough-as-nails in holding the league’s second-highest scoring offense to just one run in six innings. He pitched out of multiple jams, giving up one hit and walking one in eight plate appearances with runners in scoring position. This type of gutty performance has become the norm for Montgomery.

Since his debut last season, Monty has allowed an on-base percentage of .248 with runners in scoring position, the fourth-best mark among pitchers that have faced at least 100 batters.

(Getty)

Merry Gleyber-mas!
The Yankees finally broke through in their frustrating battle with mediocrity, beating the Blue Jays in the series finale to move more than one game above .500 (11-9) for the first time since April 4. Somehow, the Yankees have won two in a row, three of four and six of their last nine games. That sounds good!

The pre-game buzz was focused on the much-anticipated unveiling of uber-prospect Gleyber Torres, who was immediately inserted in the starting lineup on Sunday following his promotion Saturday night. When he stepped on the field, the 21-year-old became the youngest Yankee position player since Derek Jeter in 1995 to make his major-league debut in a game before July 1. And since 1950, the only other Yankee non-pitchers as young as Torres to make their MLB debut as a starter in a game this early into the season (20th team game) are Andy Carey (1952) and Mickey Mantle (1951).

While Torres had a quiet day at the plate (0-for-4, strikeout), it’s worth remembering the debut of another hyped Yankee position player prospect who was called up before the height of the summer: The Captain was 0-for-5 with a strikeout in his first big-league game on May 29, 1995.

The Yankees ultimately were carried by a couple other Baby Bombers on Sunday afternoon, as Miguel Andujar continued his torrid hitting (4-for-4, 2 doubles, RBI) and Luis Severino twirled another gem (7 innings, 3 hits, 1 run, 6 strikeouts).

Andujar’s monster day gets the coveted bullet-point summary treatment:

  • First, our #FunFact of the series: He is the youngest Yankee with a four-hit game — including two extra-base hits — at Yankee Stadium since Mickey Mantle against the Red Sox in 1954.
  • He also extended his extra-base hit streak to six games, joining Alex Rodriguez (2006, 2007) and Wade Boggs (1997) as the only Yankee third baseman to pull off that feat in the last 25 years.
  • Andujar now has 12 career extra-base hits, and is the first Yankee since Joe DiMaggio in 1936 to reach that total within his first 18 career games.

Severino’s ace status was cemented with last year’s breakout performance, so this stat should come as no surprise: Sunday was Sevy’s 19th regular-season start since 2017 giving up zero or one run, the most among all pitchers over the last two seasons, ahead of Max Scherzer (18) and Chris Sale (18). It was also his third outing this season with no more than one run allowed and three or fewer hits allowed. Here’s the list of Yankee pitchers in the Live Ball Era (since 1920) to make three starts like that within the team’s first 20 games: Severino, David Cone (1999), Jimmy Key (1993).

Yankeemetrics: Hello, Bronx Bombers (April 2-4)

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(Getty)

#Didi4MVP
The Yankees kicked off the Bronx portion of the 2018 schedule with a 11-4 rout of the Rays on Tuesday afternoon, thanks to an incredible performance by Didi Gregorius. It was their most runs scored in a home opener in nearly two decades, since a 12-3 win over the Tigers in 1999.

Before we stat-binge on Didi’s record-breaking day, let’s not forget to mention another stellar outing by a Yankee starter. Jordan Montgomery battled through five innings, allowing just one run while holding the Rays hitless in six at-bats with runners in scoring position. As Mike mentioned in the recap, the most notable thing about his start was the use of his changeup, which he said “was gone” last year.

Well, it looks like he found it in 2018. Of his 80 total pitches, 17 were changeups, a 21 percent usage rate that was well above last season’s average of 15 percent. And the results on those 17 changeups were encouraging.

He generated four whiffs — a 24 percent swinging strike rate that was much better than his 2017 numbers (15.3%) and the league average whiff rate on changeups (15.8%). Only two changeups were put in play, and both resulted in groundball outs. Stuff-wise, he got excellent drop on the pitch, averaging 7.2 inches of vertical movement, the lowest mark in any of his 30 MLB starts.

He also did a good job of keeping the pitch away from righties, painting the outside corner for a couple called strikes and getting those grounders on pitches down in the zone:

Now it’s time for the main event. Let’s unpack Sir Didi’s epic day – 4-for-4 with a walk, three runs scored, two homers, a double and eight RBI – a performance so noteworthy it deserves bullet points.

  • The eight RBI are the most ever by a Yankee shortstop in a game
  • Didi is the second player in MLB history with eight RBI in a game this early into the season (team game no. 5), joining Mike Schmidt in 1976 for the Phillies.
  • The only other MLB shortstops with at least eight RBI and four hits in a game were Miguel Tejada (2001 A’s) and Hall of Famer Travis Jackson (1923 Giants)
  • Two other Yankees have recorded at least eight RBI and four hits at Yankee Stadium: A-Rod on April 26, 2005 and Paul O’Neill on August 31, 1995.
  • Didi and Danny Tartabull (1992) are the lone Yankees to go 4-for-4 or better and drive in at least eight runs in a game
(AP)

We also have a #FunFact Guest Yankeemetric from friend of the blog, Mark Simon, who notes that the Yankees are the only MLB franchise that has an eight-RBI game from each of the eight non-pitcher positions.

Catcher – Yogi Berra, Elston Howard
First baseman – Lou Gehrig
Second baseman – Tony Lazzeri
Shortstop – Didi Gregorius
Third baseman – Alex Rodriguez
Leftfield – George Selkirk
Centerfield – Joe DiMaggio, Bernie Williams
Rightfield – Selkirk, Tartabull, O’Neill

Didi’s numbers through five team games were video-game-like: 8-for-18 with four doubles, two doubles, a triple and a single (.444/.524/1.111).

He is one of six Yankees with at least 20 total bases in the team’s first five games, a list that also includes Alex Rodriguez (2007), Alfonso Soriano (2003), Mickey Mantle (1956), Lou Gehrig (1932) and Samuel Byrd (1932). And the only other Yankee with seven extra-base hits through five team games was A-Rod in that 2007 MVP-winning campaign.

(Getty)

Three times a charm
The Yankees completed the short two-game sweep of the Rays with another convincing win, 7-2, on Wednesday. They’ve now won 11 straight home series over the Rays, their longest such streak against any opponent at the current Yankee Stadium.

Murderers’ Row II had a spectacular debut, with Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Gary Sanchez each going deep in the same game for the first time this season. Each of them quickly erased any doubts about their recent “slumps” with one swing of the bat — in true Bronx Bomber fashion.

Judge entered the game with one extra-base hit in the first five games, and then in the fourth inning mashed a 419-foot homer to quiet the critics. By the way, last year Judge had one extra-base hit in the first five games of the season, and then hit his first homer in the sixth game. Sound familiar?

Stanton was coming off a historically awful home-opening game, when he went 0-for-5 with five strikeouts. He was the first non-pitcher in franchise history to get at least five at-bats in a game at Yankee Stadium and strike out in every at-bat. He bounced back from that disaster by drilling a laser shot over the left-field fences in his first trip to the plate on Wednesday.

The ball left Stanton’s bat with an exit velocity of 117.9 mph and went an estimated 458 feet. Goodness gracious, I feel sorry for the baseballs. It was Stanton’s fourth home run that was hit that hard (117-plus mph) and that far (458-plus feet) since Statcast began tracking such things in 2015 — one more than the rest of MLB combined has hit over the last four seasons.

Sanchez had been in the deepest funk of the trio before digging into the batter’s box in the third inning, with just one hit in 20 plate appearances and hitless in his last 17 at-bats. He then crushed a towering moonshot to left, sending it 369 feet into the seats with a launch angle of 38 degrees. It was the third-shortest homer hit by Sanchez and tied for the highest launch angle he’s produced on any of his 54 career homers.

The trio of bombs from the middle-of-order guys overshadowed a fantastic effort on the mound by Luis Severino. The righty lived up to his ace status with an efficient and overpowering performance, throwing 7 1/3 innings of two-run ball with seven strikeouts. Of the 22 outs he recorded, only two were in the outfield — a first-inning popfly in shallow right field (Torreyes Web Gem alert!) and a sixth-inning flyout to left — and the 13 outs he generated via groundballs were a career-high.

Update: Yankees announce 2018 Opening Day roster

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The eighth reliever. (Presswire)

March 29th: The Yankees officially announced their Opening Day roster this morning. It is as expected, only with Tyler Austin replacing the injured Greg Bird. The roster has been updated below. Also, Tyler Wade and Jonathan Holder have new numbers. Wade will wear No. 12 (had been No. 39) and Holder will wear No. 56 (had been No. 65)

March 24th: The Yankees have not yet made an official announcement, but the 2018 Opening Day roster is set. Domingo German was optioned out Saturday, and Brian Cashman told Pete Caldera that Jonathan Holder will be in the Opening Day bullpen as the eighth reliever. Here is the Opening Day roster:

CATCHERS (2)
Austin Romine
Gary Sanchez

INFIELDERS (6)
Greg Bird Tyler Austin
Brandon Drury
Didi Gregorius
Ronald Torreyes
Tyler Wade
Neil Walker

OUTFIELDERS (4)
Brett Gardner
Aaron Hicks
Aaron Judge
Giancarlo Stanton

STARTING PITCHERS (5)
RHP Sonny Gray
LHP Jordan Montgomery
LHP CC Sabathia
RHP Luis Severino
RHP Masahiro Tanaka

RELIEF PITCHERS (8)
RHP Dellin Betances
LHP Aroldis Chapman
RHP Chad Green
RHP Jonathan Holder
RHP Tommy Kahnle
RHP David Robertson
LHP Chasen Shreve
RHP Adam Warren

DISABLED LIST (3)
Greg Bird (ankle, 10-day DL retroactive to March 26)
Jacoby Ellsbury (oblique, 10-day DL retroactive to March 26)
Clint Frazier (concussion, 7-day DL retroactive to March 26)

Cashman said German is going to Triple-A Scranton to remain stretched out as a starter. German and Luis Cessa are presumably the sixth and seventh starters in whatever order. Usually when a sixth starter is needed, it’s more about who’s available to pitch that day rather than who the team wants to pitch that day though.

Anyway, there are no surprises with the Opening Day roster. We were just waiting to find out the identity of the eight reliever. Wade played well in Spring Training and won a roster spot, and the Drury trade and Walker signing all but guaranteed Miguel Andujar and Gleyber Torres would begin the season in Triple-A. They’ll be up soon enough.

Obligatory reminder: The Opening Day roster and the end-of-season roster tend to look very different. Here is last year’s Opening Day roster, for example. Holder is keeping a roster spot warm for Ellsbury, who has already resumed playing in Grapefruit League games. He could be back soon. Frazier’s concussion looks to be more long-term, unfortunately.

The Yankees begin the season against the Blue Jays on Thursday, March 29th. There are still five days to go before the season opener, so the Opening Day roster could change if someone gets hurt — example: Drury taking a pitch to the elbow yesterday, though he escaped with a bruise — but hopefully that won’t be the case.

Yankee Prop Bets

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(Presswire)

We’re almost there. Opening Day is close enough that we can almost taste it. We’d probably be able to do so much better if not for the ever-more-stale aftertaste of Spring Training lingering on our tongues. Almost every story that could be written or thought of has been written or thought of and I’m sure I speak for everyone when I say “Just start the damn season already, please!” In that anticipatory spirit, let’s try something a little fun to keep us on edge as we wait for Opening Day: prop bets.

Over/Under

If you don’t know how this works, I’m going to put out a number for a player or players and you have to predict whether the total will be over or under that total. Let’s start with the obvious:

Over/Under 120.5 home runs for Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Judge, and Gary Sanchez. This one, for however fun it is to dream on, is a bit tough. It essentially breaks down to 50, 40, 30 for each player. For those home run totals, things have to go very right in terms of performance and health. But, given how each guy produced last year, it’s a very doable number. My heart says over; my head says just under–but still a lot of dingers!

Over/Under: 875.5 innings from the Yankees Opening Day rotation (Luis Severino; Masahiro Tanaka; Sonny Gray; CC Sabathia; Jordan Montgomery). This is another reasonable target, with a slightly decreasing innings total from player to player, based loosely on ZiPS projections. However, I’m going to go under here as such a total would require extreme health for all these guys. All of them will carry some sort of injury risk going in and that’ll keep them from this innings total. Obvious statement is obvious, but if they do meet or exceed this number, there’ll be little stopping the Yankees.

First in Line

Let’s (theoretically) bet on which player will be called up to the Majors first. If you told me earlier that Jacoby Ellsbury would be banged up this close to the start of the season, I’d’ve wagered on Clint Frazier for sure. However, given that he, too, is injured, I don’t think we’ll see him anytime soon in the Bronx, sadly. Clint, on the off chance you’re reading this, we’re all pulling for you to get better.

Knowing the Yankees, we’ll see the Scranton Shuttle started up rather quickly, so the smart money is on a pitcher. But, if the team opts to go north with just a three man bench, there will be plenty of pitchers available in the bullpen, partially negating the necessity for call ups and send downs.

I’m going to go out on a limb here, though, and say that the first call up is going to be none other than Kyle Higashioka. Call it random chance–it will be–but maybe Austin Romine gets dinged by a foul ball and needs to take some time off. Come on up, Higgy; hope it goes better for you than last time did.

The regular season is around the corner. It’s funny how time works when we’re waiting for baseball, isn’t it? This little stretch of time takes so long, but soon, it’ll be June and we’ll ask ourselves about where March, April, and May went. Soon, we won’t need to pass the time with frivolities like this. Until then, though, let’s keep speculating and dreaming about this team. It’s going to be a lot of fun.

Jordan Montgomery’s Sophomore Year [2018 Season Preview]

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(Presswire)

Around this time last season, we had no idea what the Yankees’ rotation would look like in 2018. Luis Severino was coming off a dismal 2016 season, Masahiro Tanaka could opt out of his contract, CC Sabathia and Michael Pineda were due to become free agents, and who knew who the fifth starter would be? The long-term rotation picture was pretty dicey.

Luis Cessa, Chad Green, and Bryan Mitchell went to camp last spring as fifth starter candidates. Jordan Montgomery, who was neither on the 40-man roster nor a top prospect, beat them all out for the job and wound up leading all rookie pitchers in fWAR in 2017. Montgomery threw 155.1 innings with a 3.88 ERA (4.07 FIP) and strong strikeout (22.2%) and walk (7.9%) rates in 2017. He was rock solid.

Aaron Boone has already said Montgomery has a regular season rotation spot — apparently he was competing for a rotation spot with Cessa, but a great big LOL to that — and now he is expected to produce. He’s not a fun rookie surprise who sneaks up on everyone. Montgomery is an important part of the team and the Yankees will need him to perform to contend in 2018. Let’s preview the southpaw’s sophomore season.

Finding the changeup

Perhaps the most impressive thing about Montgomery’s rookie season is that he did it without confidence in his changeup, which he says is his best pitch. “I really kind of got through the year with two pitches. If I hadn’t had my curveball and been able to throw it for strikes and expand with it, who knows what would have happened. It’s kind of good knowing I got through it without my best pitch, my changeup,” he said at the outset of camp.

Montgomery did throw his changeup last year — he threw it approximately 13% of the time overall — but he used it less and less as the season progressed, and by September it was non-factor. Couldn’t get grounders with it, couldn’t get swings and misses with it. That he pitched so well overall without the changeup is a testament to Montgomery’s stuff and pitching know-how. Finding that changeup could allow him to take a step forward this year.

So far Montgomery has made four appearances and thrown eleven innings during Grapefruit League play, though only two appearances and five innings were televised. He definitely threw changeups during those televised outings, but was he confident in it? Did it behave the way he wanted? Those are things we wouldn’t be able to tell by watching on television. To our untrained eyes, Montgomery’s changeup was always going to look good.

Following his most recent outing, Montgomery admitted his changeup is still a work in progress, but he is working on it, and hopefully it’ll click at some point. There’s not much else he can do other than throw it and continue to throw it. If it clicks, great. If not, well Montgomery showed last season he can be effective even when he doesn’t have the changeup working, which bodes well. He doesn’t absolutely need that changeup to be successful.

Will the Yankees take the reins off?

The Yankees handled Montgomery very carefully last season, especially in the second half as his innings total climbed into uncharted territory. He threw 163.1 total innings last year — Montgomery was on both the ALDS and ALCS rosters, though he didn’t appear in a game — above his previous career high of 139.1 innings in 2016. Remember though, most of his innings last year were big league innings, and those are more taxing.

Montgomery is an important part of the future — quality big league starters in their pre-arbitration years are damn valuable — and the Yankees are right to be careful with him. That was part of the motivation for the Jaime Garcia trade. Garcia made it easier for the Yankees to ease up on Montgomery and protect his arm. How many innings will he be allowed to throw this year? Hard to say. The Yankees usually don’t put a hard innings number on guys. They instead monitor them and adjust as necessary.

Beyond the overall workload, I’m interested to see how deep into games the Yankees let Montgomery pitch. Joe Girardi had an awfully quick hook at times last season. Montgomery made 29 starts and he completed six innings in only 12 of them. He threw as many as 90 pitches only 14 times. Only five times did he throw 100+ pitches. Montgomery averaged 87 pitches and 5.35 innings per start. Hmmm.

The sample isn’t large, but Montgomery’s numbers the third time through the lineup weren’t terrible. He was actually least effective the first time through the order, which is one of those things I suspect will change as the sample grows. The numbers:

  • First time through the order: .275/.335/.436 (111 OPS+)
  • Second time through the order: .188/.243/.317 (44 OPS+)
  • Third time through the order: .252/.323/.409 (84 OPS+)

Montgomery faced one batter the fourth time through the order and that batter (Ben Zobrist) tripled. That’s an 864 OPS+, in case you’re wondering.

During one of his in-game interviews with YES a few days ago, Boone said he hopes to get length from his starters this season, easing the load on the bullpen and allowing the relievers to stay fresh deeper into the season. Does that mean Montgomery will get a longer leash? I guess it depends how he’s performing on a given day. There were definitely some “why is he taking him out he’s pitching fine” moments last year. I hope those are limited now.

“I think I’m a big guy. Big lefty. I’m more than capable of going out there seven innings every five days,” said Montgomery to Ken Davidoff and Dan Martin over the weekend. “In order to do that, my fastball command has got to get better and I’ve really got to lock down my changeup. That’s what I’ve been working on.”

So what can he improve this season?

The changeup is one thing. So is pitching deeper into games. And, by Montgomery’s own admission, his fastball command “has got to get better.” That sounds like typical young pitcher stuff, doesn’t it? Work on the changeup, work on the fastball command, figure out how to be more efficient and pitch deeper into games. As effective as he was last year and as polished as he is, Montgomery is still a kid. He has a lot to learn.

Beyond that stuff, there is one thing Montgomery can improve that really stands out to me: His ground ball and home run rates. I guess that’s two things, but they are tied together. Montgomery had a 40.7% ground ball rate and a 1.22 HR/9 (11.2% HR/FB) last season. Weirdly enough, the more ground balls he generated, the more homers he allowed:

Huh. That is … interesting. Probably an anomaly too. Montgomery is a big dude (listed at 6-foot-6) and he releases the ball from … *waves hand high above head* … way up here, so at times it can be tough for him to drive the ball down to the bottom of the zone. Not surprisingly, almost all of the 21 home runs Montgomery allowed last year came on pitches belt high and out over the middle of the plate. He didn’t give up many golf shots on pitches at or below the knees.

I get the sense Montgomery will never be a big time ground ball pitcher, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing as long as they’re mostly pop-ups and medium deep fly balls rather than long fly balls to or near the warning track. Yankee Stadium is not the best place for a fly ball pitcher. Montgomery will have to make do.

One-hundred-and-thirty-four pitchers threw at least 100 innings in 2017, and among those 134 pitchers, Montgomery had the fourth lowest hard contact rate (26.5%) and the 13th highest chase rate (35.2%). As long as he continues to expand the zone effectively and generate weak contact, he can mitigate the damage from those fly balls. Montgomery might always be home run prone. That just might be who he is. But if he figures out a way to keep the ball in the park as he gains experience, there’s no telling how good he can be.

* * *

I’m more curious to see what Montgomery does this season than any other pitcher in the rotation. I think there is room for considerable growth, but also a risk factor due to his workload and the lack of ground balls. If he finds his changeup, commands his fastball better, and keeps the ball in the yard, Montgomery might be a top 30 pitcher in baseball. If the changeup doesn’t come around and limiting homers continues to be an issue, he’s a candidate to take a step back statistically.

A year ago the Yankees were desperate for a young starter to come out of the farm system and establish himself as a long-term rotation piece, and Montgomery did exactly that. That he’s a lefty makes it even better. Quality southpaws are a necessity in Yankee Stadium, and the history of the Yankees is littered with top notch southpaws. Lefty Gomez, Whitey Ford, Ron Guidry, Andy Pettitte, CC Sabathia … maybe Montgomery won’t be that good, but he sure looks like a keeper to me.